Spring harvest 2021, from Fa Zhan He area, very close to Jingmai Mountain. Our tea grower's terrace overlooks the area. An extremely floral, easy to drink, silky sheng puer tea that is highly recommended for beginners and advanced tea drinkers.
From the village of Jingmai, we can see a large mountain range with two separate peaks in the background, which we watched while sipping tea on our tea farmer's terrace.
They had the idea to explore this - relatively close to them and less known - region.
A quick search on Google Earth reveals a plateau with a town called Fa Zhan He, and a series of parallel curves in the surrounding hills close up.
In the spring of 2019, while William was busy with the harvest work, his friend Yu Jian Hui scouted the area. Following small, difficult paths, he finally arrived at the site, where he found an abandoned tea garden. In Puer County, gardens like this one, owned by "traffickers", are common, and have gone bankrupt despite government subsidies. And the tea garden was left there alone.
Yu Jian Hui brought back samples, and the quality was surprisingly high for an area with almost no reputation. He also started to develop, building up a processing plant. In March-April 2021, he made 60 kg of tea from the tea bushes, which William considered to be of very good quality and bought all the tea from an area close to his village, and therefore to his heart. A different character, yet familiar.
The tea leaves are smaller in size. They are from a variety propagated from seeds, which is different from the shoots commonly used in Jingmai. The tea has an interesting personality, so to speak. It has a softer, lighter sheng, but it really holds the tea drinker's attention and makes them want to keep drinking more cups - this has been our experience. It's also fragrant, as we've come to expect from teas from the Jingmai area.
We recommend it for those new to sheng puer and those looking for an easy to sip sheng. It can also be made into a sufficiently thick tea, with a full mouthfeel, pleasant aroma and almost negligible bitterness and astringency.
Making Fa Zhan He sheng puer
Use 5 - 7 grams of tea leaves for a 130-150 ml device. We think it is ideal to make in gaiwan, it is well controlled and the change is easy to follow. The water temperature does not need to be high. You can try it at 85-90 degrees or even close to 100 degrees. The steeping time should be 10-15 seconds, after a quick wake up you can brew tea for a long time.
You can also brew it in a glass tea maker, it is practical and a good solution. Kinto compact tea maker
